KPU given ultimatum to remove 17.5 million “problematic” voters from DPT list

A discussion titled “Problematic DPT a Threat to the Legitimacy of the Presidential Election” in the Prabowo-Sandi National Secretariat, at Jalan Hos Cokroaminoto, Menteng, Central Jakarta on Tuesday (02/04/2019). (photo: IO/D. Ramdani)

IO, Jakarta – Two weeks ahead of the general election, the Prabowo-Sandi National Campaign Team (BPN) have demanded the General Election Commission (KPU) to keep their promise of finding a solution to the mysterious 17.5 million problematic voters in the Permanent Voters List (DPT). Former Minister of Youth and Sports Adhyaksa Dault asked that the ghost voters be erased from the list. “When talking about the DPT there are only 15 days left until the presidential election, but it is our collective concern, all coordination, all volunteers, we must guard our presidential election, so this presidential election can run smoothly. The DPT until yesterday’s meeting and the BPN has continued its meeting with the KPU because 17.5 million voters are invalid or duplicates,” said Adhyaksa Dault in a discussion titled “Problematic DPT a Threat to the Legitimacy of the Presidential Election” in the Prabowo-Sandi National Secretariat, at Jalan Hos Cokroaminoto, Menteng, Central Jakarta on Tuesday (02/04/2019).

Adhyaksa stated
that the 17.5 million voters make up 9% of the total DPT. As a result, according to him, these voters must be delisted. Adhyaksa noted that the problem with the DPT started
when the KPU only asked for data of young and retired voters from the Ministry
of Home Affairs Directorate General of Population and Civil Registration. KPU
then used old data to complete the list. As a result, he asked that the KPU not
deflect responsibility to the Directorate General. “That’s 9% if summed up, as
a result, we ask the KPU: When is the
deadline to resolve this? From the volunteers we ask that this is deleted instead,” said Adhyaksa.

In an agreement with
Adhyaksa, Directorate General of Population and Civil Registration (Dirjen
Dukcapil) Director General Zuldan Arif Fakruloh stated that since the creation
of the Potential Citizen Voter Data (DP4) in December 2017, 95% of the work of
Dirjen Dukcapil, Ministry of Home Affairs, and Minister of Home Affairs was done. The rest of the data needed was on
unemployment improvements, retiring Military-Police, and citizen deaths and
movements. “After we submitted the DP4 it is the authority and responsibility
of the KPU to process the data and more. We cannot make corrections if there
are mistakes. Here, we want to clarify that the Dukcapil
and the Ministry of Home Affairs are not participating in adding or erasing
data. We can only provide input. The authority to change the DPT is with the
KPU, Bawaslu, and DKPP (Honorary Board of Election Organizers),” he said.

Habib Rizieq
Shihab Center Chairman Abdul Chair Ramadhan stated that the 17.5 problematic
voters in the DPT could undermine the legitimacy of the presidential election.
He also believes that it could result in the loss of one of the candidates. “As
is known, the 17.5 million allegedly invalid number has a systemic impact on
the defeat of one of the candidate pairs or could result in a win for one of
the candidate pairs,” said Abdul.

BMPPAB (People’s
Front for a Fair Election with Integrity) Coordinator Marwan Batubara gave an
ultimatum to the KPU to immediately invalidate the 17.5 million voters. If not
quickly resolved, he worried that there would be a show of people power as such
fraud was being done in broad daylight.
“Our ultimatum to the KPU: immediately delete the 17.5 million invalid data.
Put them into a special DPT and immediately prepare a legal umbrella; an
additional KPU regulation or a government regulation. On the 1st (01/04/2019), we sent a letter to the DPR (House of Representatives) to
immediately call on the KPU to immediately take a policy in overcoming this
problem,” he explained.

Marwan believes
that since December 2018, the KPU has not made significant improvements relating
to the BPN’s findings of the 17.5 million problematic voters, even though since
January 2018, the KPU stated it would start to take steps in matching research using
a budget of Rp 1 trillion which would be followed by a declaration. “However,
if the results are like this, it can be seen there is an intention to
manipulate. As a referee, the KPU is not trustworthy and is buying time. We
cannot accept this; invalid data must be resolved with sampling, it should be
done with matching research. Forget about the 17.5 data, please make improvements,” he added.

Addressing the high
occurrence birthrates on January 1, July
1, and December 31, Zuldan Arif Fakruloh said these dates were used for residents who forgot their birth dates.
According to the Dukcapil data, voters born on January 1st totaled
2.6 million, on July 1st totaled 10.3 million, and December 31
totaled 5.8 million.

However, when
compared to data submitted by KPU, the data was different. As stated by KPU
Commissioner Viryan Aziz in the DPR on Tuesday (26/03/2019) in his
presentation, the DPT was based on his
findings of 17.5 million voters.
According to him, there was abnormal voter data; the number of voters born on
January 1st, July 1st and December 31 were very high at
2.3 million, 9.8 million and 5.4 million respectively. This resulted in the KPU throwing the problematic data back to the Ministry
of Home Affairs Dirjen Dukcapi. How could the KPU data and the Dukcapil data be
significantly different?

Prabowo-Sandi National Secretariat Chairman M. Taufik, who arrived near the conclusion of the discussion, ended it with encouragement that the KPU could still fix the problematic data. “Concerning this problematic data, we face this year to year in elections, e-KTP could also not be resolved. Hopefully, this is a lesson for the nation which continuously works to fix Indonesia’s democracy. There is little time left. We must move, guard the voting booths. Inshallah, Prabowo-Sandi will win,” he concluded. (D. Ramdani)